1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is generally related to a biochip, and more particularly to a biochip with a three-dimensional structure and a method for forming the same.
2. Description of the Prior Art
At present, the biochip detection technology becomes increasingly important in biotechnology. The biochip detection technology can simultaneously detect various pathogens on a single chip and improve the detection limitation achieved by traditional technologies. A microarrayed biochip is generally prepared by aligning a large quantity of bio-probes (DNA's or proteins) on a chip substrate and is used for analyzing or testing samples by the hybridization of DNA-DNA or specific binding between proteins. According to the detection objectives, there are two major categories for microarrayed biochips: DNA chip and protein chip. DNA chips use nucleotide molecules as the probes to detect their complementary nucleotide fragments. DNA chips can also be categorized into complementary DNA (cDNA) chips and oligonucleotide chips, according to the length of the probes spotted on chips. cDNA chips are often used in the research of gene expressions; while oligonucleotide chips can also be used in diagnosis of pathogen and genotyping in addition to gene expression analysis.
For DNA chips, probes are immobilized on substrates and used to detect specific DNA fragments by the characteristic hybridization with complementary DNA's. DNA chips can be applied on disease detection and shorten the time for developing new medicines. DNA chip is also a powerful tool for analyzing DNA's by appropriate dye labeling in visible emission lights. By different emission wavelengths, individual target DNA can be distinguished and analyzed.
The application of biochip is vary wide, including gene expression profiling, toxicology analysis, gene sequencing, SNP identification, forensics, immunoassays, protein chip, combat biowarfare, drug screening, hard drives and microprocessors.
The improvement of detection sensitivity by modifying the substrate surfaces of traditional biochips is currently still being sought to obtain amplified signals to facilitate further analysis. Thus, a novel biochip preparation method is proposed to achieve the high-sensitivity performance.